White Wave
by Frucht.Fledermaus
Summary: "Stars, hide your fires. Let no Light see my black, deep desires."
1. The Way Home : Sleep Dealer

_**Doom Counter: T-minus 14**_

_White waves descend, a cold wet fog from end to end;_

_in rows of slumber elm lined and under_

_midnight orchards and wakeless tortures._

A dayfall with low hanging fog's muted embrace as Lightning puffed the chilled air. Absently, she traded breaths with the wind, it's haze rippling shortly past the wiry tree limbs bowing ahead. Elm trees in rows and rows, reverent as their bare black twigs on bare black stalks made a crown shape across the wispy horizon white. Stillness in the big hush.

It is night; black-white, black-white.

Her back is pressed against one of the towering trunks, arms folded, leaning to let the sensations spring up along her skin, cold and slick. Shallow clouds are dense in the air, wet with the scattering of silver tinselly rain, all theatrical in limpid prickling drops ready to burst with frost.

Her head also felt damp. Heavy. Sogged with bad dreams diabolically real. Philosophic bear traps of logical development. After two days of heavy sleep, it was time to get out. Time to be here again.

She raises one hand to her face and absently brushed her fore finger along her bottom lip. A thought. A pause before lamely holding her hand out and kissing the air with another exhale. The fog tunnels as it passes over her palm and a fire spell is cast, cupping the slack ember in her hand. She contemplates using the flame for warmth, but instead holds it abreast. Now pulling herself from the trunk she presses through the fog. Blind settling in, the small fira- a guiding light.

A slow stride as her boots walk her across the on and off sections of gravel. Unkept patches of grass cropping up along her path, the end of her cape ghosting their tips.

She makes her way through the fog to her motorbike. It is white; nearly invisible here, save for the ivory shade it has as her embering hand comes closer. She extinguishes the spell as she astrides herself on the bike.

Engine fire, revved throttle -hot metal. Crows.

The familiar black birds perched for tonight scatter at the sound ringing through the air, the ebony swarm raising up past the tree line and into the ash sky. That display never got old.

"Time to go make some noise," she breaths to herself as she guns the bike.

It isn't long before she hits real pavement. She flicks the headlight on and the engine block glows an incandescent blue along with all of the dials and singling lights. She holds the clutch and steps into third. Any faster and the wind for sure would be too cold, her clothes and bare arms wet from the clammy atmosphere. It'll be snowing soon. Another month or so.

Almost unthinking, she pilots forward.

Midnight.

* * *

Serah was looking far off, her thoughts miles away from her head. She absently titled her head in one direction thinking that if she shifted her whole skull, she'd catch a concrete idea.

Nope, too buzzed. Or maybe a little more then buzzed. She lost count of the free drinks she was given by the dimwit guy she was sitting next to at the bar. Maybe he wasn't a dimwit, just oblivious to her lack of real interest in anything he had to say. Whatever, he had an attractive voice. How his voice sounded was about all she could hear over the crappy bar music. She lost track of anything he had been actually saying for a while now.

The safe life. Work, gin parties, drunk ego-pandering, shilly-shallying, fiction. It wasn't the best course of action, then again, life directional skills were never her strong point. She usually left that to the stronger people in her life, the people who knew better about practicality, emotionalism, stability. Not her. It was just easier to be taken care of, even after her parents died. At least she still has, had...

"Love this song! Hey oohhh...listen what I say ooohhh..." he sang.

She snapped back to the moment, holding her head to steady herself. It felt like it would float away if she didn't hold her temples in place.

"What? Sorry. Are you a chili pepper's fan, or something?" she half heartedly asked, her eyes slowly finding his face.

"Nah. Just this song. It's my name! Snow!" he smirked and continued singing along. "Hey oohhh...listen what I say ooohhh..."

She rolled her eyes and tried to sound less annoyed then she felt._ Tried_.

"You realize the song is referring to an addiction, right?"

He stopped bobbing his head with the tune before stopping to regarded her quizzically.

"What?! No it's not! No way! Wow, I think you just blew my mind! You're really smart, you know that?" he said slowly as he leaned in closer, putting his big hand on her shoulder. "And pretty. No, hot I mean..." he trailed off chuckling. "I mean pretty. You have a very pretty face."

She tried to smile. He was definitely drunker the she was and it was becoming harder to deal with him politely.

"I'm sorry. That's rude. I'm drunk, but I don't mean to be a jerk..." he slurred again as he tried putting words together. His hand moved closer to her. Her eyes followed his fingers, now lightly thumbing the edge of her shirt. He was sitting to her left and she was about to pull away when she heard the song change, recognizing it right away and groaning.

"Fan-tastic," she muttered, holding her head again.

Snow paused, heavy lids blinking slowly, "Whasa matter?"

"I hate this song," she said quietly to herself. She grabbed the bottle in front of her, not remembering she had ordered a beer to slow herself down with after several vodkas, her drink of choice. The dead, burning water. Whatever. A swig.

"Huh? Notta fan of Mr. M?"

"Mr. M? Does anybody actually call him that?"

"I dunno, I do. It's one of his better covers," Snow said, starting to slowly head bang along. "I just Love his metal covers. Those 80's ones. He makes them into something else. KnowwhatImean?"

"Something like that..." she said, about to take another gulp of beer. She froze when she saw a familiar hand resting on the bar next to her. The strong, bare arm, the presence of cold from being outside. She followed the arm across to the pale fabric, the collar bones, to the necklace and rested negligibly too long on the lips. Then, the leer: the slow subtly faithless frown, and the horror of the worst, the dream of the worst, came at last into its own.

Serah paused, mentally trying to resuscitate herself. Ironic how she thought of a bolt or two of something would do her nicely right about now. Her vision cleared, mask glued back into place. Stoic. Breath.

"Ah, it was you," she spoke slowly. "Isn't _this_ song a little cliché, even for you?"

She took the last sip of her beer, narrowing, engaging herself in something small until she finished mentally recalibrating. Lightning didn't answer right away, only turning to notice the approaching bar tender and the head banging gentleman sitting next to Serah.

"Even so, I admire your boldness. You are _gracefully _insane," Serah said, almost lost in her sentence. She was starting to regret having this much to drink.

"Quiet, darling, you'll miss the crescendo," said Lightning, curtly. Military inflection.

Serah's brow wrinkled, slightly staggered, "I fucking hate it when you call me that," she snapped, now not making eye contact; absently moving the bottle counter clockwise in her hand.

"I know."

The tender arrived, asking for Light's order. Without turning to face the barmaid Light, again using her practiced military tone, insisted on two blackout shots. She ran her fingers through the rain in her scalp, then rested both of her elbows on the wood behind her.

"Gonna scream this time?" asked Lightning. In one motion she swept her hand across the bar to one of the shot glasses and knocked down the inky grog. Unflinching, unbothered; setting it down and grabbing the second before halting the lip of the glass at the front of her mouth.

Another sidelong glance to the gentleman still head banging, his face reacting to the word 'scream'. One big strained blink before word hurling.

"Who's scream'n. Heeey, Serah. Who's your friend?" said Snow, slurring more then before. His hand dropped from her shoulder, swinging before it landed on her thigh. Both Lightning and Serah could see his mind sluggishly trying to form a thought, the song's steady baseline trawling steadily behind them.

He tried again, "Waitta mintue! I've seen you before! Yeer that big shot army chick. Or were. Barron, Sharron..."

"First Lieutenant Farron," Lightning cut in, saving he and herself the embarrassment of going through the alphabet of names.

He snapped his fingers in an ah-ha, "Thas it. Why'd you quit?"

Lightning slugged back the second shot, shorty waving to the tender for another. Serah too looked unnerved by the question, grimacing before pulling the edge of her skirt down. It seemed involuntary, but Lightning noticed the reflex immediately, eyes locking to Serah's hand.

The barmaid returned, setting the shot down. Lightning picked it up and again held it halted at her lips. She turned her glance back to Snow.

"So Serah, who's this? Tonight's prey, I assume." Lightning said, shaping the words thickly, darkly.

Serah flinched, before closing her eyes. The previous drinks and continued waahing of guitar now making her sick. The music building as a moment passed without talking. The singer repeating a phrase until breaking the tension with a scream across the crowd, ringing out, bleeding out the rest of the melody.

Metal guitar pangs fading out the tune, rocking vaguely. Lightning lulled on the last words before half heartedly polishing off the black drink, her attention wanning. She knew Serah wouldn't answer such a question. She stood still, both elbows remaining on the counter behind her, torso outward slightly while still having her firm expression.

Serah looked visibly upset and accepting at the same time.

Snow chimed in, "H-hey, uhm, you two need to go talk er something? I could get a cab or whatever."

"Certainly not. The two of you seem to be getting along so well. Serah, I insist he takes you home," Lightning contended.

Her eagerness made Serah more uncomfortable, again avoiding Light's eyes. Snow looking rather confused about the whole exchange waited for Serah response.

Lightning dropped a few coins on the counter after a wipe to the edge of her mouth. She leaned past Serah to be sure Snow could hear her.

"It's nothing personal. Target's a target," she spoke, slow and blackly before leaning back. She noticed Serah's jaw clench and again she was holding the edge of her skirt firmly down, both gestures entirely noticed.

Once more Snow was puzzled by the whole encounter. Lightning stood hardened, solid, resigned. A moment passed in silence before Lightning turned to leave. She stopped just next to Serah, angling toward Serah's ear before she breathed two words to her.

She tried not to shiver.

Lightning continued past the pair and made her way toward the door. Snow turned to watch her exit, rubbing the back of his head and ruffling his brow.

"What was thatta 'bout?" he tried.

Serah put the bottle across the width of the table and reclined back on her barstool, pausing before she answered.

"Nothing. Ancient history," she decided it wasn't worth elaborating.

"History? Like... history, history? Do you, uh..." he attempted to gesture with both sets of his index and middle fingers, then failing at trying to criss-cross them.

Serah stared at him briefly, repulsed by the motion, then rolling her eyes.

"N-no, I... I don't swing that way. Haha. Besides, she's my sister. Doublely wrong," she tried to laugh off the last part but felt down right nauseous.

"Sister, huh. Good. Cause yeer too pretty to be one of those... lesbians. Not that they're not pretty, but it'd be such a... a waste if you were one-a them."

He moved his hand to her arm again thumbing her pale skin and shirt, not noticing the glare. She was again fighting the urge to slap his hand away.

"Didn't she say something to you before she left?"

"Yeah." she replied, looking down again, remembering why she was fighting off how she was feeling now. The feeling always happened after she saw her sister. Guilt, rage, then the whirlwind of self-destruction all wrapped up nicely in the thinly veiled title of masochism. That's what she called it, anyway. Sorting out what it really was involved thinking about it, and thinking lead to feeling, which was the last thing she wanted. Now, tomorrow, yesterday, a year ago...

And why bother thinking about it when Lightning was all too happy to ram the feelings down her throat for her.

"What'd she say?" said Snow, snapping the reality switch back on.

She stopped, remembering to resuscitate her brain again for the moment. The drinks were making it difficult to switch between internal and external conversation. She sighs.

"Sweet dreams."


	2. Vermilion : Slipknot

_**Doom Counter: 13**_

_Quivering Centaur,_

_how your ribs furrow in gyration._

_Guide and move_

_twin hands to trace the wound_

_with no absence of knives for cure._

* * *

At this point it was as useless for Serah to question her decision as it was trying to stop a bullet already fired from a gun; this relapse to pull the trigger. Motions already set in motion. The behavior should disgust her, and it does. That's exactly why she's doing it.

She all but dragged the lumbering Snow to her front door paying little mind to his incoherences. Pulse starting to rattle her nerves as she raked through her bag for the house key, frustrated from the boozes still soaking her better judgement. It was cold, sharper air then she remembered. She was thankful when Snow offered her his blanket of a trench coat after leaving the bar. Perhaps she should have been more cautious about taking home a practical stranger, perhaps not. A shame, he really did seem like a decent guy.

At last she holds up the key, though her eyes locking to something she hadn't noticed before. Across the way in the garage window was a light, red and streaming through the far off glass.

Vermilion.

The garage was unconnected to the rest of the 2-floor, brick lined house and had been converted into an apartment a while back, now complete with a familiar white motorbike parked outside.

Snow followed her gaze to the red. He too must have found the glower of light striking through the weather smoke, its streak stains across the mixture of urban scape and lawn. He exhaled slowly, breathing out, "Pretty..." in a murmur.

Serah grabbed his hand, jamming the key into the lock with more force then she intended. Wrong one, tries again, click; yanking him harshly into the house and only an instant before they are up the stairs.

Into the bedroom, the back of the door slapping the wall behind it as she pressed herself to him. Black, bleak, sick.

No time to think about it, his hands immediately on her shoulders, neck, and face. She didn't even remember taking off his jacket. He felt warm, pressing herself into his kiss, solid, hard, contrasting. He moved his mouth to her neck as she threw her stare to the ceiling, seizing the bandana from his head as she flung it across the shadows.

He had removed his gloves, trying to be soft, considerate, warm. Serah wanted none of that as she grabbed his hands. She flushed them against herself wanting him all over. Nothing untouched, nothing untainted.

She pushed him backward onto the bed nearly tripping on the edge of the duvet, disoriented by the black and arbitrary throws. She grabbed his feet to rip off his boots which, to her surprise, had thankfully become untied at some point.

A lunge forward, now clawing at his shirt needing to feel the hard muscles beneath. Feel his flaws, his oily nuances, the rough patches of hair along his jaw- anything to fondle if it makes him real, make him a person- something more then an end to a means.

Hands mapping to his skin, dragling wanton nails along his body. He was everything she didn't need.

Again to his face, uncaring if she was actually kissing his lips or not. Mouth to mouth compensation. She pulled back as his hands found her shirt, again he tried to be tender in his hold. She started moving against him in a slow frantic show of how she _should_ want him, his length solid beneath her. The drinks humming in her head, sloshing, keep treating the curse and letting it build, letting it build, letting it build up inside her.

Her eyes snapped open finding the single window in the room, the aperture facing out to the far side of the house spilling moon shadow throughout. Looking outside, the azure of her eyes spot the burning red piercing through the fog and wile. The light all but casting itself inside her head, imprinting, like it was watching from the inside.

She rocked her body on top of Snow as she again turned her gaze upward, the red light coming in long stains across the ceiling, looking down at her movements. Haunting, taunting with the hold they had over her: both her slave and master.

Face down. Annihilate the flux of fear in her blood, switching its current to defiant flight. She pulled off her own shirt then grabbed Snow, forcing him to pin her, press her down, make her drown in the shadows and sheets. Moving him to dominate, making him make her moan. She didn't care, as long as anyone, everyone, someone could hear her.

He went back to kissing her neck, she gasps, clenching her eyes shut. Visionless, her fingers find his pants, the zipper. A quick pull, slack, toss.

She was shaking, letting it build, letting it build, letting it build up inside her. She didn't bother guiding him to pull her skirt down. The alcohol swimming through out them both insisted on everything now, lifting her hips, needing it _now_. He held her shoulders and kissed her again before he was there.

Hurt going in, clean as a razor.


	3. Mad World : Sungha Jung

_**Doom Counter: 12**_

_In silence, they meet and pass_

_with well-behaved ambivalence;_

_as autumn lies to the edge of dark,_

_escorted by fragments of former warmth._

* * *

Zebra stripes of morning laid on the walls and angled ceiling, stretching its light both soft and forward through uneven drapes. The dawn of gilded gray rilling through pink cloth into vibrant rich pink shadows dressing the corners of the room.

The morning had spent itself in a stupor, a common feeling for Serah after a night of drinking and dreams. Her half conscious eyes lingered on the sunlight caught in the drapes, letting her skin feel the warmth through the pinky fabric filter. Sunlight like this always made it harder for her dreams to ware off, her body taking longer to acclimate from vision to real life.

And in her dream was always the clear red of Lightning.

Not the harsh, steel Lightning that marred her day to day with biting words and edgy sarcasm. Her Lightning. Radiant Lightning, both bright and strong. Eyes that both break and sate her insides nightly, unfolding the trances in her mind petal by petal with their blue-white ice.

She melted walls with her stare, Lightning, though not everyone could appreciate her effortless intensity. That boundless blue that hauled her forward. At one with the drive to achieve, the drive to be more. She wasn't always that way, no. Not back when she still felt like a sister, like a person. When she still felt like Claire.

When their parents died, Serah remembered crying for days, hardly able to eat and having to take a leave from school to deal with her mourning. It took everything out of her just to get up for the day and not miss them in her every thought. Only because of her sister's help was she actually able to finish her studies on time with the rest of her school mates. Tutoring her and never letting her say it was too hard or too much to handle, enforcing that she was as passionate as their mother and quitting wasn't an option.

Her sister must have inherited their dad's behemoth like stubbornness and sense of tough Love, and she had to admit, it was nice having her sister's maturity and support, even if it meant she had to show it in her own way.

In the back of her mind however, she always felt her sister was the one who took their parents deaths the worst. Unflinching and narrowing her everything almost immediately into getting a job so she could care for the two of them. In most ways she felt that her older sister never really did deal with the grief, never allowed herself to deal with the malignancy of its pain, choosing instead to stifle it away- forget.

Instead of burying mom and dad she buried her suffering, her fragility, her joy, and in most ways she felt she buried herself.

She buried Claire.

'Lightning' didn't seem to have the weak, coping emotions Serah displayed; trading most of her humanity for a whet of determination and striking all she did with the incandescent energy of a perfect storm, flying through the ranks in the service because all Lightning ever could think about was training. Training to achieve, training to succeed. Training to fight the past from ever happening to her in the present. Foisting forward and always elite, never expressing her private wounds or distracting herself with anything or any _one_ else...well, except for Serah.

Lightning only ever seemed to go on dates with her gunblade for hours on end after work, sharpening its physical and mental blade, crafting herself into the perfect weapon to face the one person that tore all of her efforts down each day: Claire.

From a distance, it was that same desperate dichotomy that sweet and evidently sick Serah could not resist. That _almost_ sexless, neurotic luminescence that she became both possessed and endowed with; wanting her sister in ways she should have found appalling. The pale and distant looks she would give, specked with something black. Her own damaged adolescence freshly wounded and wanting the mature glow of Lightning. She had no real idea how the feeling came in or even how to let it out.

There are openings in our lives of which we know nothing and they make us somehow responsible for our actions, yet utterly helpless to them.

She needed to take hold of that question, that lacerated slash of childhood vulnerability. It was that same thought that grew itself into an obsession, and how that obsession infatuated itself into depravity. Sick, sick depravity. She needed to know where the temptations came from but instead found herself with a how, how she could get rid of them?

One day, when she was doing homework in the kitchen, she over heard her father say to her mother, "The only way to get rid of a temptation was to yield to it. Resist it, and your soul grows sick with longing for the things it has forbidden itself." At the time, her dad was referring to his job... or that's how her mom explained it when Serah asked.

_Right_, as Lightning would say.

It started off innocent enough, as do most playful passions of maturing girls. Most.

The lingering glances when they would be speaking, watching Lightning with just that extra bit of too much attention during breakfast. Having that giddy knocking of her heart when Serah heard the brroom-brroom rumble of her sister's motorbike turning down their street. Absently eyeing the pink shades of things durning the day when they seemed to match Lightning's hair, the pale rose cast becoming an almost fetish, really.

Day dreams when she would be cooking in the kitchen listening for Lightning in the basement, waiting for her to come upstairs from working out and wishing to feel her warm, slick from sweat body come up behind her and press her hot breath up and down her skin. Nails, oh her nails clawing the side of her ribs and neck.

Then it stopped being so playful. Lightning started to notice her little crush. Serah realized she knew when Lightning would not act as if she noticed at all. Typical Lightning. For having such a striking name, she sure would take forever to react to things.

One night, Serah was in her room, dark, except for a few rose tinted candles. She was touching herself, carving her own venery, breathless and unrestrained. She thought of Lightning's feminine heaviness on top of her, doing things Serah had no business envisioning her sister doing. Self-ravaging her unravaged limbs searing with the twisted, warped, and decadent wantings for Light. Wanting Lightning _painfully._

She grabbed one of the candles from her night stand and held it near her neck, her fingers still sliding against the skin between her legs, hooking them every so often. Dripping the wax against herself, the instant pain and wan as the liquid burned and solidified down the length of her throat, collarbone and chest. A stifled moan as the wax flaked off like pink cake icing from her movements.

Her fingers slipping unevenly now, her back stiffening, hips now slightly raised. She moved the candle lower, now just above her navel. Again sweet agony as she felt all the blood and nerves rush in furor to her stomach and then between her fingers now moving faster, ridged as she bit her lip and choked down another cry.

She should have been more embarrassed when Lightning questioned the dark imprint on her neck the next morning. Serah dismissed it as a hickey, thinking it was safer to pass the blame onto someone else's misguided frenzy. In retrospect she should have paid more attention to Lightning's expression, or lack of expression that morning then all the attention she placed on trying to be coy in front of her sister.

Lightning asked if she needed to have 'the talk' with Serah about being safe with boys. Serah laughed, immediately appreciating the irony of 'that talk' coming from her own seemingly sexually sober sister. She pulled Lightning's hand across the table and held it, thumbing the skin of her palm, assuring they would not be needing to have that discussion about boys.

Again, she should have paid more attention to how quickly Lightning pulled her hand away, excusing herself from the table and soon after leaving for work.

Serah repeated that night several times, each one becoming more daring. A little more hot wax _here_, slightly louder cries _there, _all but becoming a slave to the temptations that possessed her. She called it an accident the night she left the bedroom door slightly ajar.

"Mmmmgood morning..." said Snow, thudding an arm over top of her.

Startled, she dragged herself to awareness, stepping out of her sleepiness one thought in front of the other. He pressed the scruff of his facial hair to the back of her neck. She can feel his nose nuzzling the side of her face. She feels him wrapping his arms around her bare skin underneath the blankets. Oh, right. She was in the present, not the past.

She furrows her brow, turning herself in his arms and looking into his face, the slightest bit of romance in his morning breath. Or was that just the left over booze?

* * *

Snow held is head on the kitchen counter now clothed, disheveled and groggy.

Serah slid an ice pack toward him, noticing his eyes squinting at the faint gray day coming through the windows. Slowly, he lifted his whole head, smiling slightly when his eyes found Serah. She stood holding her hands tentatively on the edge of the counter, opposite to the side he was on as he slouched in one of the stools.

"Thank-you," he started, pressing the coolness to his skull, a nice headache rattling through is head.

"Don't mention it, can I get you some water... or orange juice maybe?" said Serah, barely seeming to feel the effects of last night physically.

"I'll try the orange juice and see how that goes... h-hey, thanks for letting my recuperate a little before heading home. It means a lot..." he said, as Serah made her way to the cabinet for a glass.

"It's really not a big deal. I think it'd be a bad idea for you to drive home in the state you're..." as she walked the glass to the counter and then herself over to the fridge.

"I can see you're a thoughtful person, at least from what I can tell. I really don't know much else about you though... we really didn't get to know all that much about each other last night," he said with a slight smirk on his face.

The smugness annoyed Serah, but she poured his glass of orange juice regardless. She could play a long for now.

"Okay, what did you want to know?" she asked, plainly.

He seemed a little caught off guard, "Oh, um.. I dunno. Well, uhh...is this your parent's house or something? Like, do you live with them?"

"No. My parents aren't around. They died a few years back, actually."

"Oh! I-I'm sorry to hear that! I didn't mean to sound insensitive. I was just-"

"Making small talk. Snow, it's fine. I know. I know you didn't mean anything by that."

Again, he seemed surprised, "Oh, well. I'm glad I gave off that impression. I guess you weren't as gone as I was last night. I'm really sorry if I seemed... too pushy with you. What with what happened afterward and all..." he said, flicking his eyes upward in regard to the bedroom.

She eyed him, noticing the expression on his face for a moment longer then it needed to be.

"Eh. It's in the past," she shrugged.

Snow seemed a little confused by how plainly Serah was regarding the exchange. He tried to remember what they could have talked about last night, his memory pretty fogged at this point.

"Oh! Wait, you have a sister though. Right? At least you have her around through all of that. Wasn't she at the bar last night?"

"I suppose. She was great to me when the whole thing with my parents happened. We got really close then, and she's always been really smart, always knowing what to do," Serah started, "I remember I was taken out of school at the time because I was missing a lot. To help me stay on track, she home schooled me. I remember her teaching me chemistry through cooking."

Serah slid him the orange juice. He took a sip and winced a little, letting the tart coat his tongue before setting the glass back down, Serah noticing the orange drink dripping on the rim of his mouth.

"Oh yeah? That seems pretty neat, actually."

"Yeah," she said, pointing to the juice, "a whole week of acid and base lessons came from that cup."

"Jeez, a little brutal on Vitamin C, wasn't she?"

"Tell me about it. One of the reasons I hate tomatoes..."

He laughed, taking another sip, wincing less this time. He noticed how Serah seemed distant suddenly in her glance.

"I got the feeling last night, from what I can remember, you two were kinda... off toward each other these days," he paused a moment before adding, "Does that have anything to do with why she quit the military?"

"...you could say that..." she said, carefully.

Snow noticed her hesitation right away, backpedaling, "I-I'm sorry. It's just that it was all over the news a year ago. As soon as she said her last name I remembered the headline..."

"N-no. It's fine. You don't need to apologize so much for asking me questions," not realizing she was looking down now at the counter when she said that instead of Snow.

"I'm sorry. I know I just met you. I feel like I'm striking out left and right here. You seem really nice, Serah. I don't want to mess something up between you and I."

She looked up, "Oh, you think there's a you and I now?" she said trying to giggle away the last part of the conversation.

"Yeah! I mean, no. I mean... I hope so..." he said scratching the back of his head.

Serah turned away, facing the sink, her eyes cast down again. She could feel the next question coming out of Snow's mouth and knew she wasn't prepared to answer it. Honestly, she didn't really have an answer. She didn't want to involve him in anything, certainly not anything from her past but even when he asked the question it seemed to take her by surprise.

"Did something happen to her?"

Serah paused, taking a deep breath, the exhale taking forever to be over. She found herself looking out the window above the kitchen sink, noticing the faint rays of sunlight trickling through the gray-white clouds. Her eyes came to the drive way, seeing the absence of a motorbike before another long sigh found its way out of her lungs.

"Yeah."


	4. From Heaven to Dust: Azam Ali

_**Doom Counter: 11**_

_By day a duet of shade and light_

_as the midnight hymns lose count._

_One sits;_

_the other, without._

* * *

_Bearing witness to the same dream, each night an ageless vision._

_Her senses taking the coalescence of memory and metaphor, mingling and mizzling the two over her lidded mind and then mish-mashing the pieces of her thoughts, the imagist, back together. Rending passion in her world shrunk tight like a yawning abyss. And always, always, there is _snow_. _

_Nightly, like a hymn that grew louder with each echo, the dream would evolve: Smokey white against a snow-filled sky, a distant twilight coming back for the axle of winter. Watching the black twisty thickets of forest fill with snow on the darkest evening of the year, like an empty room. The downey flakes casting a crystal veil over an orchard, a bastion of tree lines and whited air. The unblooming petals waltzing in the wind, their snowdrops pale as ash covering all the stars and hidden thorns. _

_White, weightless. Bright, painless._

_A sharp intake of air and the moment is made breathless by the sight of her sister, the ghost of a smile curving her lips. She is stepping closer, soundless and dumb. The snowflakes, they disappear under her...she doesn't see._

_White, splendor. Bright, surrender. _

_In her sister's hand she can recognize her compact survival knife, silver and exact as its round hinge unfolds. She can hear the distant click as the blade snaps into place. _

_Then the terrible shriek that pierces her ears, always the sound of crow caws ringing across the sky. The birds warble. Air is thick with a charge, magnetic and dense as it courses with an electric current until she hears it: the rumble in the clouds. An indigo-flash lights up the veins of the sky and she is sick. A violent quaking through out her body as she is falling over, coughing, heaving, blurting hot tears and shaking in a fever. _

_The virgin snow beneath her trembling palms is now speckled in vermilion drips, enervating, blurring her vision. The tidal of blood beating loud, loud, loud in her ears as she faces up to the woman; her sister now standing over her, the glint of the survival knife in her hand. The woman leans down and pauses in front of her face, cupping her jaw gently and tilting it toward her tongue now slowly sliding along the splashes of blood adorning her mouth. _

_She tries to speak, but her body is going into shock and _all she can do is watch_ as everything is shaken into black._

* * *

Lightning always awoke after that last moment, sitting up and panting erratically, her body and blankets slick and heavy with sweat. She snapped her hand under her pillow, conditioned from years of training to check where her weapons were when startled awake. Survival knife, check; eyes across the room to blazefire, _disassembled_, check; scan for any present threat, all clear.

A quick wipe to the fresh beads on her face as she holds her head at the wrinkled v of her brow, breathing a numb minute in the updraft. Cool air came in through the slightly open glass and laid itself on her skin, a modest shiver in its touch. Morning had evaporate itself to afternoon and she squints despite the hour, the sun being too bright still for tired eyes.

The ex-soldier sighed through her nose, the imagery from her head dissipating slowly into reality. She waves the sheets off and swings her legs to the side of the bed, pads of her feet on the floor, her black shorts and dark tank top still lightly damp. The cool metal on her palm reminded her that she was still holding the survival knife underneath the pillow.

Fingers wide, palm up and out to catch and feel the shape, sliding it out and holding it over her lap. She spreads the blade, slowly unfolding the weapon and then running her finger along the handle and hilt, its curve matches some deep memory of beauty. Something that matches.

She holds the tip over the faded vertical line going down her bare thigh. A scar.

A swift click as she closes the knife and returns it to under her headrest, the silver instrument palled. She stretches her neck from side to side, rolling the weight of her head around once before squaring her shoulders as she pours out of bed like a fluid. Her legs move her to her desk, to the striped down gunblade decorating its surface, nuanced and cleaned.

_'Hey Blaze...'_

She eyes the pieces, silent. In one jolt her hands are seizing the gun and blade parts rapidly snapping the bolt into place, the lower receiver, springs and charging handle, in the firing pin goes: snap, lock. In an instant she is aiming the barrel to a target outside her window, one eye closed for focus. Her sight in line with the adjoining house off of her apartment, to the darkened second floor window, to Serah's window.

A single black feathered bird is sitting on the sill admiring the wet autumn earth around it. It cocks its head to the side when it hears the distant click of the unloaded chamber fire. Lightning lowers her hand, sword reanimating as the blade unfurls. She holds it out in front of her, the wooz wooz in the air as she figure eights through the evening creeping in her own half shut window.

She admires the sound of the blade severing the air, eyeing its polished edge before setting it back on her desk to disassemble as quickly as she had put it back together.

How strange to know what you _used_ to do and to still feel _how_, yet now _can't_.

It hurts.

And pain will change everything.

What you are.

What you will be.

That is the gift of our spirit.

It is a constant turmoil of light and darkness, strength and frailty, beauty and unsightliness. At times, it is nothing but a curse, straying beyond our control... causing us pain and sorrow. Its effects ripple up and down our timelines, always.

Lightning walks over to her night stand, retrieving her mobile phone and flicking it open. Two missed calls, both from Fang. She is about to close the device before it starts rumbling in her hand. Surprise, surprise- its Fang. She answers.

"Farron," she speaks into the gadget, unable to lose her military inflection.

"Hey there, soldier- how's my favorite Lieutenant?" said Fang in her usual charming drawl.

"I'm not your soldier."

Admittedly Lightning felt some pangs of guilt for not being the same reliable friend that Fang had always been to her. She had an unusual amount of sternness toward the Pulsian the past few months but, true to form, Fang was seemingly immune to Lightning's moods.

"Yeah, yeah. So what has you so busy today?" she continued.

A pause as Lightning realizes why Fang was really calling. _Ah._ "I missed my appointment, didn't I?"

"Bingo. Vanille's been callen' wondering if I'd seen you? Said something about a twenty-four hour cancellation policy."

_Right. _Slept through this afternoon's medic appointment. She hadn't intended to miss it, though it was also not exactly the first thing on her mind. Another pause as she looked out the glass panelling again, noticing the black bird still perched on Serah's sill arranging and rearranging its feathers. "Reasons," was all she could manage.

"Gottcha. I'l be sure to tell her the excuse you're giving is 'reasons'."

"That's as good an explanation as any."

A pause on the other line. She could hear a sigh from Fang.

"Okay. Do I get to know the real 'reason'? People lie to their medics all the time, but I would hope you see me as-"

"I over slept. Now if you don't mind I'd like to get back to-"

"Now, now. Hold on there, hot-mess. Since I actually have you on the phone, ya know, that thing that rings and you usually hit the ignore button- I was wondering if you'd be interested in getting a drink with me tonight."

Lightning always appreciated the directness of Fang. The solidness of her beauty. It had been a while since they had seen one another or had a decent conversation. Their version of a conversation.

How Fang would speak in her pleasant manner, a sultriness in her vowel shapes and go on and on about how she thought life would be, _should_ be. The casual insight she had into a person, for the better or worse- how she could understand the voltage of life people can carry and tolerate and at times... enjoy.

She always thought Fang hung around because she liked the challenge of trying to read her, the challenge of trying to understand. There was never any other reason Lightning could see- she certainly never made it easy for Fang to follow the currents that ran through her and to the greater extent, that was how she preferred things. She was grateful when Fang would assume things one way and the ex-solider would never bother to clarify that it was the other. The look Fang would give would tell her she knew more, but she was either smart or considerate enough to let it go- whatever it was.

Fang referred to Light's moody nuances as her 'battalion of fixes.' It seemed fitting enough.

The static on the phone reminded her Fang had been waiting for a reply, "I'm not sure I'm-"

"Great! I'll see you at eight o'clock, sunshine."

"Fang, I'm-"

"You can pick me up. Vanille has your potions and meds. I'll tell her you're _soo_ thankful that she was able fill them out for you and that you'll be _soo _much more considerate for the next appointment and-"

"You made your point, Fang. I'll pick you up."

"That's my girl. Don't be late, and _so-help-me _if you even think of picking me up on that damn bike. It's freezing outside, Farron. Or haven't you noticed?"

She eyed her window still ajar, her drapes waving vacantly, "Well what do you expect me to-"

"See you then, soldier," and then the line was dead.

_'I'm not a soldier', _she thought as she too closed her phone. She looked at the clock on the wall thinking she had just over an hour to get ready. Her hand felt the dampness still lingering on her shirt and thought a shower was definitely needed. Her fingers stopped when they felt the raise of metal near her collarbones. Her necklace.

The slight dart shape of silver and gems resting just above her heart, somehow fixed in its position with rapaciousness.

Looking out at the house across the way, she could see the windows were dark letting her know that Serah was not at home. It'd be easier to get a shower and be in and out before having to interact with her sister. Best to act now.

Before leaving her apartment, she made sure the window was latched. With a change of clothes in hand she stalked toward the house, veering toward the back door and then swiping the key from under one their flower pots. She paused, looking at the dried out plant, the cold having taken all its color. It is almost winter.

The lock clicked and she entered, swift and stringent as she moved through the darkened kitchen and down the hall toward the stairs. She was starting to feel more and more like a stranger in her own home. Something intercepts her thought and is stopped short before the stairs. In the black she can see the outline of picture frames set up on a glass table.

She can see all the flat faces dull from time. An old wedding photo of her parents, the two looking starry eyed into each other through the grain of years. Another of herself standing with her first rifle next to her dad. She remembers spending the day with him shooting old bottles in the back yard for practice. She can still feel the scar on her brow from when the scope kicked back and hit her in the forehead.

'_Now you know not to look so close at your target!' _he said, chuckling at the way she scrunched her face trying not to cry in front of him.

In another picture, it was mom and Serah. Her sister couldn't have been more then eight or nine and mom was holding her like a precious bouquet, all smiles and content with motherly affection.

The last photo was of the two sisters from a few years later, after their parents were gone. It was the morning of Lighting's first day in the guardian corps. Arms folded across herself while Serah was very firmly holding her from the side around the waist. Serah was smiling, her head resting on Light's shoulder; Lightning, practicing her new expressionlessness in a scowl. Despite the face, she remembers being proud back then.

Before the memories begin to flood, she turns and heaves herself up the stairs, mimicking the same grimace from the photo. The shower is on almost as soon as she's in the bathroom, the steam puffing in shortly after. She undresses, her clothing peels across the granite floor.

A pause in front of the foggy mirror before her hand streaks across the surface, her eyes catching on the silver of her necklace in the unmist.

Another mental dam before the mental flood as she slips into the shower, closing its fogged glass door behind her. The running water is hot, febrile; the waves pulsing and pulsing along her body. She can almost feel the knots in her frame dissolving under the faucet as she closes her eyes and sighs. It isn't long before she loses track of how much time she has spent under its current, her thoughts feeling distiled in little wavelets.

She hears a click across the room as the steam is funneled out by an inward moving coolness. The only thing she can make out is the slightly blushed hair of someone, that someone, moving toward the mirror and vanity. Like a stone, unmoving, she stays put according to habit.

Her sister stood in front of the mirror, the scent of her perfume mizzling with the subtle heat of the wet air. Serah too streaks her hand across the polished surface and looks into herself, into the same wet gash where Lightning had previously. An overlay.

Serah is touching her mouth, painting it in a color as she looks in the mirror. The steam floats by between the two like clouds; Lightning can feel her head getting soft with no inner walls to measure against. She can tell Serah has turned to look at her, the mirror now seeing her back, reflecting the image faithfully.

A moment passes in a tone of muted grief and _all she can do_ is watch.


	5. Whore: In This Moment

_**Doom Counter: 10**_

_Between heart beats_

_the archer fires a softly burning kiss, _

_unsexed from crown to toe_

_by her perfect aim and design. _

* * *

The air flowed about like thick shadows from the surrounding multi-colored lights splitting like schizophrenic phantoms, grotesque and faintly repetitious; their beams laced in colored neon with tiers of lights, blinking, syncopating in the dark.

"I didn't think Serendipity had bars," said Lightning as she and Fang walked across the stone checker board floor.

"They got all sorts of stuff here. Most of the kid shenanigans is up in front for parents and such to spend the day with 'em. Our kindof fun is back this way."

"Our kind of fun?"

A smirk carves itself across Fang's face, mischievous and coy.

"This is more then just a drink," grumbled Lightning.

"And you're more then just over due for some shameless fun."

"I could just leave your shameless ass here, Fang."

"And abandon a poor smokin' hot gal like me here all by herself? Puh-lease. Ya wouldn't!"

"You mean a poor defenseless _hunter_ like you."

"You're a hunter too, so cram it with your attitude toward me. I'm here to show ya some fun for a change. This is now, and now, and now. Live it- ya might even enjoy yourself!"

Lightning looked at the sign over the section Fang had been leading them towards; all lavender splashes and gold lettering that read, 'Primerose Path of Dalliance,' above their heads.

_Ha._

Electric music with touches of modulated guitar and vocals pandering from inside the area. It was clear they were venturing toward more adult sections of the establishment by the way the staff's uniforms seemed to become evocative of a more 'mature' clientele. Short, silky, revealing.

Before they are able to enter, an attendant was waving for their attention off to the side. She wore black stockings that lead up to a short black skirt. Her silk like white blouse seemed to glitter in the colored lights. Her face was ornamented with a black mask that stopped over the band of her eyes and extended up into a set of black velvet rabbit ears.

"Enchanté ladies! Please, please, do come over" she said waving her arms about in their direction. "Do come and have your cards read! Find out what your visit to Serendipity has in store for _you_! Your first single card is on the hooouse!"

Fang gives a look to Lightning before yanking her by the arm over to the girl.

"So what's this all about? What are these cards you're yappin' about here?" asked the Pulsian, cocking her head over top the small table in front of the woman like an oversized bird. A small shuffle of cards sat positioned in the center of the surface.

"These cards have been charmed! They have the ability to pick up on the direction that energy is flowing and depending on that, they can illustrate to the person drawing them how they are supposed to use that energy."

"Charmed pieces of paper? Gimme a break," shrugged Lightning.

"Now, now. There is always a skeptic," said the attendant, seeming to be unphased. "As I said, the first one is on the house. Would you like to see how it works? How about if the lady in the blue sari draws first?"

Fang unfolded her arms and tip-toed her fingers across the surface to the stack of cards. She flipped one over onto the table.

"Ah, the moon! Awe... but it's in reverse."

"And what is _that_ supposed to mean?"

"Well, its a water card, emotional energy, so if it were upright it would tell me that your natural intuition would be your best guide for tonight. Understanding the 'moon shade' of situations, the shadows, the feelings- being able to see that not everything is as it seems. "

"So how 'bout the reverse?"

"Umm...you might just be feeling _off_. Like when you know there's more then meets the eyes, but you just aren't able to tell what that is... so... unsettled is a good word for it."

"Well I wasn't feelin' so unsettled until you _said _I should be unsettled."

"I should mention it is a 'major' card which means it could be referring to a situation as a whole and not just how its effecting you or you're affecting it."

"Well that makes me all sorts of reassured," grumbled Fang as she turned her body outward to grab a glass of champagne from a passing server with a tray. She gulps half her glass down before wiping her mouth. "Light, it's your turn. I wanna see what _your_ energy is for the night, little-miss-animosity."

Lightning gave her a sidelong sneer before uncrossing her arms to draw a card.

"The hanged man."

Lightning stared at the dealer, waiting for her to get to the point and elaborate.

"_Well,_" she said adjusting herself, "May people believe this is the card of Odin. Legend tells that he hung himself from the tree of life, Yggdrasil, in order to gain ultimate knowledge. He hung himself upside down and was pierced by a spear as a sacrifice for information and self guidance."

Lightning continued to stare at her, waiting for the rest of the card's explanation; her shoulders raising slightly as her patience began to recede.

"So..so the card usually means that you have the answers you seek already within yourself, you just need to be willing to look. To acknowledge what needs to be done."

"Wow..." said Lightning, obviously annoyed.

"Yes, Miss?"

"It pisses me off when people say crap like that."

"W-would you rather another card to clarify what it might be that needs acknowledging?"

"No," was all she said as she curtly turned and started toward another part of the section.

"Wha- wait! Lightnin'!" as Fang sets the fizzy glass down to go after her, "Hold up there!"

As Lightning enters the dimly lite room followed by Fang, there are empty chairs set helter-skelter about a smooth square polished floor where small groups of people seize one another on a dance floor. They cross over near bar where there is more canned music coming, synthetic and formless, over loudspeakers concealed partially in the curtains along the walls. The bar itself is on the left wall as they come in, with great mirrors reflecting all the glassy bottles, tall, thin, short, fat, holding, cradling their fluids- ruby, garnet, gold, transparent, and the bar tenders in white-clad uniforms and black masks over their eyes.

A few couples are sitting on a slowly revolving raised platform in the center of the room with strange plush couches like an S, with two seats in each curve, facing each other. A slight swelling in the middle for a table with a brass pole going up to the scalloped top of the merry-go-round. The seats turning quietly and sweetly, all well-oiled.

Fang leads Lightning up the steps of the merry-go-round to one of the strange s-shaped divans, and they sit down facing each other. The waiter comes up, subservient, bent over his pad solicitously. He too is in the white suit and black mask uniform.

"What'll you be having this evening?" he speaks over the sounds of other couples and music.

He leaves to retrieve the wine order and moments later returns: something pale for the Pulsian, and a blush wine for the Cocoonian. They sat conversing lightly as the server would attend to them with another round, and then another.

"Ya know, if they substituted the word 'lust' for 'Love' in popular songs, I think it would be closer to the truth," Fang mused as she sipped on her third glass.

"Tch."

Lightning sat as the alcohol caressed her into a soft brain stupor, appreciating the lilt in Fang's voice as the Pulsian made small talk; a serene sense of slow inevitability gliding in, slowly consuming. The air had changed in the room, the movement from the revolving platform setting into her senses. Then Fang struck her attention.

"So how are things with you and Serah these days? Has anything changed?"

Lightning took a sip, a pause to consider her answer. She leaned her head back a bit to look at the slowly spinning design on the ceiling.

"I am important to her. She comes and goes. What happened casually remains."

"And that somehow makes it all okay to you? That thinking'll put your heart out like it was your only eye, Light. "

Fang paused before continuing, she too mildly feeling the drinks, "So, you wanna tell me why you really missed your appointment today? This is the forth one..."

Lightning took another sip, tapping the side of her glass; a sigh inciting that she was not planning on answering Fang's question.

"Lightning," as Fang choses her words carefully, "I hate all this- I really do. The Light I know wouldn't just roll over like this. You've become so passive about all-a the things that really should matter to you."

"Mattered."

"I know that ain't true- I know it all still matters. You've just lost your fire lately. I know you're still the... well, the flash of _Lightning_ you were."

"But I am not the Lightning _you_ know, Fang," added Light, eyes down, turning her wine glass counter clockwise on the table by the stem.

Fang's expression was briefly confused before adding, "Look, I appreciate you talking to me about all this, but if you keep thinking like that- you're gonna drive the world morbid, Lightnin'. This half- deliberate, half-desperate idea of cutting yourself off from living is going to...to.."

"Bring me closer." Lightning spoke in a mumble.

The music, going on, disturbing, haunting, ineffably strange and deeply moving, with all the great thin flashes of sound, of lights, of insight. Fang pretended to not hear her, feeling partially that if things left themselves unsaid, they would remain partially untrue.

"You need somethin' to spark those embers in you- somethin' real. Not this pining over someone who is fuckin' half the town. To this day I haven't the faintest idea why that don't infuriate you when she does that."

"...because I know it's incidental. A side effect."

Fang rolled her eyes, "Kinda like what happened in the snow between you and her that night?"

Lightning took another sip before clearing her throat and changing the subject, "Maybe you're right, maybe my radical self should be horrified by this behavior."

"All I'm sayin' is- go to your Medic. Vanille's a good one and she knows what can help you treat the physical stuff you can't treat with your rip roaring, fly through the air thoughts alone."

Lightning took a deep breath, settling her demeanor. The air around her moving again, this time with the strange change in song across the speakers. The vocals are breathy, seductive, and layered in insightful grit. She listens, knowing... this is payback.

_**'I'm the girl you're thinking about...'**_

"And besides, sometimes Loving is another way to fly..." added Fang, starting to reach across the table to Lightning's hand before a familiar voice interrupts.

"...and sometimes Loving is another way to die," said the voice coming up to their booth from behind Fang. Lightning's eyes locked to the figure immediately, withdrawing her hands to fold them in front of herself and feigning her guarded exterior.

_**'...the one thing you can't live without...'**_

"Well... by the pricking of mah thumbs," the Pulsian said without turning, her smile dissolving into thin air as she tapped the table in a row of fingers.

"Ha. Ha...hello Fang, mind if I sit here?" said Serah, inviting herself to sit on the edge of their table, one bare thigh crossed over the other; her brown, knee high boots had a snake of metal wrapping up along the calf of the shoe. A double breasted, silver studded black grey jacket with orange-gold frill like tassels on either shoulder wore her body; low rise denim shorts exposing the skin line of her midriff. Her eyes were avoiding Lightning's at first, though only physically. Hair back, demure behind the ears.

"I didn't say hello, or that you could drop your skinny ass on our table," growled Fang.

Serah, pretending not to hear, putting her arm on the Pulsian's shoulder, resting her elbow in the crook of Fang's neck lazily. She watched Lightning watching her, appreciating how her ruffled feathers never move.

"Hey, sis," began Serah, "It must be a special occasion for you to be out and about."

"Yes. It must be," said Lightning, now absently cupping the drink in her hand, "Nice song."

A smirk as Serah reaches across to Lightning, to the glass, touching, ghosting her fingers against her sister's as she pulled the wine away from her. She drew the vessel to her mouth, rolling the rose-tinted liquid in the bulb of glass indulging in the perfume of fermentation, savoring. "Feeling sentimental?" she says as little in_sin_uating sparks alight themselves in her dove gray eyes.

"Terribly," Lightning added with a cock of the head and deliberate sarcastic guise.

_**So how can this be?**_

"Well that's a shame," eyeing her older sister through the translucent rose before finishing the drink. She uncrosses her legs and parts them slightly, "...since I've been revoltingly unfaithful to you," as she tilted her neck to lick the rim of the glass.

_**...you're praying to me...**_

Serah could see Fang rolling her eyes in her peripheral, a "_bloody hell_" under the Pulsian's breath. Lightning shuttered with a sharp intake of air. Serah watched, finding something odd about that reaction- something not quite Lightning.

_**...there's a look in your eyes...**_

"So what is the likes of you doing here?" Fang interjects, "Shouldn't you be slinking back from some scandalous liaison or something?"

"Would you be jealous if I was?" smirked Serah.

"Ugh! In your dreams!"

"Ha, ha. In my dreams you're never jealous, Fang. In my dreams you just join in," added Serah, now thumbing Fang's collarbone in jest, which Fang flung off of herself.

Serah noticed how Lightning's eyes were distracted by the approaching form of Snow, studying his features. Acknowledging his tall, deliberate, pompous stride through the crowd and up onto the platform. She instinctively withdrew from Fang, and crossed her legs again. She orients her forearm across the scarring line going down her right thigh; Lightning, of course, taking note.

_**'…I know just what that means...'**_

"Well, well, well- must be my lucky night. Three beautiful women all at one table," as he leaned into plant a kiss on the top on Serah's head and extends a hand to Fang as a greeting, a "Nice to meet you," in the motion. "Hey there, Sis," as he nodded his glass toward Lightning.

Startled, Lightning immediately snapped her full attention, "What did you just call me?"

"You're Serah's sister, Lightning, right? Nice to see you again- my name's Snow. I don't think we had a proper introduction last time. My bad..." as he tipped his beer in her direction.

"Yes, I'm sure it was," said Lightning, slowly.

_**'…that I can be...'**_

"Is your name really Snow?" asked Fang, breaking the awkwardness.

"Is hers' really Lightning? Ha ha." chuckled Snow, oblivious to the mounting tension, sipping the frothy foam from his beer.

Lightning shot a glare in his direction, a vague, seething desire to throttle him in the throat.

"Oh Sis, calm down. He didn't mean it like that," cooed Serah, knowing Lightning might actually punch him for a comment like that.

"Like what? Did I say something wrong?"

"It's nothing, Snow, don't worry about it," Serah still trying assuage the conversation.

"No, if I said something that offended her, I didn't mean to. Especially if it's about her not being with the Guardians anymore..."

Fang began, "Now, now, ya big lug. I think you should just stop talking before you say anything that might ruffle any chocobo feathers here..."

_**'...I can be your everything...'**_

Lightning stood, taking a deep breath- another unsettling shutter in her exhale. "So, Snow, was it? Did my, _darling_ sister here..." putting her hand on Serah's forearm- the one concealing the mirrored laceration, "Tell you why I can no longer preform my functions in the corps. as a Lieutenant?"

"Lightning, don't..." Serah said quietly, feeling Lightning moving her fingers _oh so slightly_ over her thigh, the movement mostly unnoticed by their slight audience. Two can play at this game.

_**' I can be your whore...'**_

Lightning felt the skin beneath her hand becoming warm, softly burning. The touch and feel all succumbing and sexual under the resilient lights. Silent, insidious.

_**'…I am the dirt you created...'**_

"Did she?" asked Light, oddly beguiled with her tone.

_**'...I am your sin...'**_

Fang sighed heavily, not knowing where this was going. She crossed her arms and tapped her elbow in frustration as she watched the gears moving in Snow's head. She almost felt bad from the guy, not knowing what he was getting himself into with any sort of context or accurate perspective.

Snow spoke slowly, "N-no, she didn't. All she said to me was that the article didn't mention..."

"That I killed someone," finished Lightning.

_**'...I am your whore.'**_

Fang stands, immediately. She waits a beat before facing Lightning, before pulling her hand up to slap her across the face. "You think that's funny?" said the Pulsian, brow ruffled, emotional nerves inflamed. "That how you remember it happening?"

"Fang, stand down. This doesn't concern you," growled Lightning, her expression unflinching from the gesture.

"The hell it doesn't, soldier!"

"I'm not a soldier anymore," Lightning barked again, shuttering again, shaking in an almost heaving breath.

"You think I don't remember how it all went down that night? I was there to mop up her spilt milk," as Fang gave a riled nod in Serah's direction. "I know what I know, Lightning."

Serah stood from the table, now alarmed by Lightning's breathing, nervousness simmering in her expression. Lightning, while continuing to glare at Fang, tried to steady herself.

_**'...but let me tell you something, baby...'**_

"And I'm getting sick 'n tired you wasting your time, Light. All you have is now, and now, and now," reiterated Fang, her tone becoming heated.

"Shut-up, Fang," as Lightning shuttered again; one hand on her chest, the other on the table. Serah moved to put her hand on her sister's shoulder but Lightning swatted it away. The younger girl could have sworn a spark had stricken her instead of Lightning's hand.

"How can you just accept this all as a solution? How can you stand there and rationalize the rest of your life away!?" barked Fang, a few people in the surrounding crowd having turned to see the mounting commotion.

"I said, shut-up!" Lightning now dizzy, disoriented from within. She pushed past Serah and Snow, past the swarms of pedestrians and off the platform. Serah could feel the electric charge for certain in her contact this time. The expression on Snow's face hinted at his confusions; both from the thunderous sensation and all that had transpired in such a short time. Serah and Fang looked at one another, an instant of commiseration as they both hurtled after her.

Lightning was staggering toward the exit, heaviness in her stride. She thought she could hear Fang calling out over the hive of dancers and music, over the sloshing of emotions sickening, thickening themselves in her shell of a body. A myriad of uncoiling, unwrapping, unsheding, unpeeling petals in her core- all happening in between seconds, in between thoughts, in between heart beats.

She felt as though electricity had replaced the scarlet in her veins; anxious, unpredictable, white-hot live barbs of wire.

_Was it all happening again?_ , she thought.

She could see the exit sign, hazily, a blur of red neon as the music still hammered in her frame. The vibrations of sound blackening her vision, her body growing faint and bilious in a cold sweat. She stopped, feeling a hand on her shoulder, another spark flaking off in the touch. She tried to catch her breath as she turned to see who it was, breath recalibrating; the song still echoing in the back of the black.

The faint to ground is weightless as Serah stood over her, spinning as she landed with her image upside down, a ringing of pain in her side; suspended in the numbness as black settles in and all Serah can do was _watch. _

_**'...you Love me for everything you hate me for.'**_


	6. Hello: Evanescence

_**Doom Counter: 9**_

_Darkness peels in curls of black_

_by the gentling of rose-tint candles,_

_now dieing with a little patience_

_in the language of silence._

* * *

Rain fell, slanted long and harsh on the roof outside Serah's windows, liquidly, dripping, plural and generous from the low black sky, fluently saying whatever she choose to make it say. She sat, enclosed from the outside wetness. The rapping of the gutter, hard and metallic in the musical falling of itself; very beautiful bad weather.

Watching the rain like this, on nights like this, feeling like this- it made her realize the water level of her understanding is always beneath where it should be. The night's events wound themselves tight inside her, blurred, unreal, as if seen through falling snow... her heart numb with hope. Hope that Lightning would be alright.

After Lightning passed out Fang had taken her to see Vanille, Light's Medic, in hopes of finding out what had happened. Fang _politely _told her to '_back off'_, and that Fang would handle things. She watched the Pulsian take her sister in a public transport vehicle that Snow had flagged down for them to use. Poor Snow, he must have been so confused by everything that had happened. He was nice enough to take Serah home and not ask many questions about happened. He offered to stay with her- to be there if she needed but Serah said no, and then again no after his several insistences.

Serah looked over at her mobile device, seeing it light up with another of Snow's calls. She watched as it went to her message box, seeing the number four next to the missed call symbol. She didn't know what to say right now, her aloneness and selfness were too important to betray with company or calls. It was so much easier talking to the rain, to the neutral impersonal force that couldn't hear her thoughts and merely accepted her being. Sometimes all you can do is watch, so she continued waiting from her window to see if any of the cars hissing by in the wet street would be Lightning coming home... completely fine.

And she didn't come and didn't come and didn't come.

So she continued to sit and wait and sit and wait in her room remembering the sensual observations that made this night reality, deluding herself into thinking -almost- that she could return to the past. She had lit candles, their pale red warmth splashing the air and walls in memory stains, smudging her mind of the last time she painted her room this color with rainfalls outside.

She remembers the night she wishes she could spotlessly forget... instead of regret.

Back then, that night: Lightning stood in the door way, arms folded, one side leaning on the frame of the wall. At that moment, while listening to the tinsel of rain outside, it didn't matter how many tinted flames echoed from the candles around her, all Serah could see across the room was the insatiable blue of Lightning's eyes looking at her. She couldn't remember the last time she felt that centered, that converged in a given moment. A part of her always felt like she was looking out into something else in her life, but here, her sister standing across the room- for once felt like a now. Something was so different in Lightning's presence that night; a sex-motivated hunger they both knew was reciprocal. Everything within herself now felt like condensation coating the room; her fears, Loves, lusts- vague and nebulous. All things that began to simmer as she felt the compulsion to admit her original sin:

_she wanted the person she should never have wanted._

Yet how wonderful the apple tastes once you have taken a bite- the tongue drenching juices that fill your mouth, seeping into every pore, satiating every querulous moral fiber of your being. How it _sucks_ obsessively, pulsing with the throb and pain of a _terribly_ disciplined libido. She thought of how contrastingly disciplined Lightning looked while she stood there, unmoving, her breathing slow and easily rhythmic. The length of her torso, breasts against the flatness of her flesh-taut ribs; wanting to translate everything about her body into the language of limbs. Wanting those piercing eyes clenched tight in rattling lust.

… but the only thing Lightning exposed about how she felt was the absolute naked adoration in her eyes for Serah- and Serah hated that. The look... terrified her.

There was no reason for the sudden terror, the feeling of condemnation, except that circumstances all mirror inner doubt, inner fear, and the fear was already there and had been for so long. Fear and grief from their shared past as sisters growing up alone. Losing the things in your life you find most dear. Perhaps when we find ourselves fearing everything it is because we are dangerously close to having it. After all, she still had Lightning.

Serah Loved her sister. Serah lusted for her sister. Two very different things that never seemed to reconcile together within herself. Probably because to some extent she felt that one feeling existed in her head, the other her heart, and one of those two feelings was dominating the other in this moment. It was becoming harder and harder to temper the two sides of herself. She knew if she acted she could never go back- that things would never be the same between her and Lightning. Her and Claire.

But it was too late: her body had already walked itself in front of Lightning, smashing her sense of separateness across the room. Serah felt her chest fluttering, trying with deep breaths to calm herself, to straighten her posture in an act of feigned confidence. She felt something move within Lightning, or so she thought; a vulnerability rising from a shared, unspoken weakness. Serah moved her hand to touch the side of Lightning's face but before she could, Lightning had grabbed it, holding it in place. Something flickered in her sister's eyes then that, to this day, Serah was never entirely sure what to make of it.

The next thing she knew, Lightning had flipped their positions and pinned Serah to the wall, mouths lapping as tongues of fire while Lightning nearly crushed her breathless in ardor. Her wants were very hard and Serah wanted them, very hard. Power, Lightning had that; the touch of her hands against Serah's body felt her in ways that could have been termed possessive, all sudden and deep. Her skin becoming molten beneath each stroke and fondle and breath and caress and taste.

The thick, streaming rain lashed itself outside in the dripping air.

Lightning kissed down Serah's neck, pausing to bite and suck on her collarbones. She pulled the fabric of her shirt apart to kiss across to her shoulder and do the same. Serah dug her nails into Lightning's back the same moment Lightning flushed hers into Serah's sides. Serah flung her head back against the wall, the rose-blonde of her curls teased, her hips slanted boldly forward. She felt Lightning beginning to trill her lips down the length of her body, a hallowing warmth in her wake as she began to kneel herself on the floor in front of Serah. Serah's eyes fluttered closed and she felt Lightning lightly tugging the fabric of her skirt down her thighs. She listened as she felt Lightning breathing her in, a breath so agonizingly close to her searing body, the nearness electric within itself. Serah was in hugh lust, fighting, screaming, biting in ferocious ecstasy of orgasm in the black waves of Lightning's kisses.

And then it was cold. Lightning had stood up in front of Serah with the azure of her gaze looking straight through her again, this time in a gentleness. Serah tried to catch her breath before she heard Lightning say,

"How high shall I take you?"

The words came like knife thrusts, smiting Serah in clean quick cuts as the blood of Love welled up in her heart with a slow pain, yet she had never felt so happy in that particular way. It was at that point that Serah's Love for her sister had become both tender, and sad. She knew everything that Lightning was doing to her now was an act of actual Love. Planned. Intended. Nothing misguided in her lust filled gestures. Lightning- the strongest being she knew, was submitting to bend to anything Serah would ask, all ending in derivatives of devotion. Something she could not understand in value. Not now. Serah couldn't think, her mind swimming in white hot flame flowers of emotion, lapping at her malnourished better judgment. She tried to settle her expression, shutting her eyes and feeling the back of her head against the wall. Something ached within herself and spoke for her,

"Drown me"

The rest of the night passed quickly, it seemed. Too quickly. She remembers feeling the dawn creep up underneath her spent limbs while lying close in the strength of Lightning- warm, near and unthinking; beauty in her altered state of mind, by accident or persuasion.

Then there was the night in the snow. How it thundered, how it hurt. How she wished Lightning hadn't been so stupid, so fearless- but desire is not instinct.

And here she is in the now and now and now- spiraling back into herself, swimming, drowning, sick with longing for something she can't even think to express because her own inner self will not say it in words. And time passes but now how it drags, limps, loiters, stalls, procrastinates.

She had to quiet her feral mind, escape the mist of her regret.

She picks up her phone to dial Vanille... but was it really that easy?


End file.
